BISHOP NIKODIM BUSOVIĆ AND UNIATISM IN LATE 17TH AND EARLY 18TH CENTURY DALMATIA AND BOKA

This article deals with the role and activities of Bishop of Dalmatia Nikodim Busović at the end of the seventeenth century and the beginning of the eighteenth century. For Dalmatia and Boka, these were tumultuous times caused by the Morean War (1683–1699), with increased population migrations and increased Uniate pressures on the local Serbian population. During this turmoil, the Uniate archbishop of Philadelphia, Meletius Tipaldi, attempted to expand his influence and bring the Serbian Orthodox population in Dalmatia under his jurisdiction. At the same time, Catholic bishops in Dalmatia and Boka, protégés of the Congregation for the Propagation of the Faith, were pressuring Serbs to embrace Uniatism. Under these circumstances, Bishop Nikodim Busović managed for more than a decade to skillfully maintain the Serbian ecclesiastical organization under Venetian rule. After his suspension, Serbs in the coastal area of Dalmatia and Boka did not have a bishop until late eighteenth century.